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Is there any future for the GTK-based Desktop Environments?

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Re: Is there any future for the GTK-based Desktop Environments?

#91

Post by throwmeariver1 »

konart wrote: post #28
throwmeariver1 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s OSS you are no one’s guinea pig. If you don’t want to participate you don’t have to use it if the ones who participate want to try other things switch and don’t complain like a old male whore on the sidelines.

>If you don’t want to participate you don’t have to use it This has nothing to do with OSS though. You can switch from a closed sources solution too. The problem is you investment and attachment to certain things.

Yeah, the differences is if heh wants to change something for the better he can try.

Re: Is there any future for the GTK-based Desktop Environments?

#92

Post by dTal »

sph wrote: post #43
konart wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. Now if only people start investing in UI\UX on linux desktop.

Honestly, the real hurdle now seems to be the support for paid apps. It's such a taboo in the Linux world, for some reason [1], but thankfully Flatpak and Flathub are working towards that goal [2], which ElementaryOS already explored. I want small, high quality apps like macOS has. I want to make a living building open source software that can be supported and bought commercially—no, donations and sponsoring isn't go…

It's "supported" just fine now. You certainly don't need some centralized app store or weird quasi-distro. As you say, it's 100% a cultural problem. No amount of technical effort will change that Linux users expect their software to be open source, and that in practice you cannot sell open source software.

Re: Is there any future for the GTK-based Desktop Environments?

#93

Post by anthk »

smegsicle wrote: post #17
ogogmad wrote: post #9

I'm using KDE5 at the moment, and it's essentially problem-free. It's got more features than I know what to do with, but this somehow doesn't detract from it but rather enhances it. KDE5 never seems to be the default choice of desktop environment for distros like Manjaro, but you're unlikely to go wrong picking it as your default option, if you're given that option.

isn't slackware sticking with them for the default environment?

Yes, but In Slackware you can deselect KDE and KDEI and then XDM will launch XFCE as your DE just fine.

Re: Is there any future for the GTK-based Desktop Environments?

#94

Post by anthk »

sprash wrote: post #74
linguae wrote: post #19

Given non-GNOME developers' frustration with increasingly GNOME-centric releases of GTK, and given some of the licensing issues surrounding Qt (such as the one-year delay for FOSS releases of the toolkit: see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25748335 ), I believe the time is ripe for a BSD-licensed GUI toolkit for X11 and Wayland that uses server-side decorations and tries to be as unopinionated as possible in or…

There are several "unopinionated" tookits out there already. Nobody uses them because it is all a matter of popularity. The most popular toolkit by far is called HTML+CSS+Javascript. You might hate it but the point of no return has been passed ages ago. So If you want to make a difference implement a browser with a trusted zone for local applications (which are allowed to occasionally call C-routines to get native sp…

Eh, no. QT5 is THE serious cross-platform toolkit. Everything else it's a turd deserved to be shunned. Microsoft Teams it's seen as a disaster even from die-hard MS users.

Re: Is there any future for the GTK-based Desktop Environments?

#95

Post by anthk »

AnonymousPlanet wrote: post #34
onphonenow wrote: post #10

Fast windows 95 would have been fine. Instead the devs lost their minds w design craziness. VS Code and chrome pycharm etc means it’s not a huge deal - they are all x platform

Not for people who are not mentally stuck in the 90s. I am very glad things have processed and have left the ugliness and usabilitly problems of Windows 95 in the past.

> ugliness and usabilitly problems of Windows 95 in the past.

You can't be more wrong. Windows 95 was built on solving usability issues.

My fluxbox+rox env has a Windows 95 taskbar albeit 10% shorter on the left and right sides so I can right click for the menu fine.

Re: Is there any future for the GTK-based Desktop Environments?

#96

Post by konart »

throwmeariver1 wrote: post #91
konart wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>If you don’t want to participate you don’t have to use it This has nothing to do with OSS though. You can switch from a closed sources solution too. The problem is you investment and attachment to certain things.

Yeah, the differences is if heh wants to change something for the better he can try.

In case it is something relatively minor - yes. Fork and rock. Though this is a though decision in itself - you will have to continue the support of your changes, merging upstream changes etc. So in many cases this is a mostly fictional option.

In any other case any person will have a long list of better things to do.

Re: Is there any future for the GTK-based Desktop Environments?

#97

Post by nix23 »

sph wrote: post #70
nix23 wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is the connection here? Why would you install the calculator not coming from your distribution?

Because there is a push for software developers to be able to package directly for end users. Without devolving into the usual flame war of whether it's a good idea or not, once you install any piece of software you incur some security risks. It's not like distro maintainers are a 100% guarantee there won't be a backdoor in the binary, and compiling software from source doesn't free you from risks either, unless you…

That's not what i asked, why do you trust a no name dev more then the distro your kernel is coming from? And do you really think flatpack prevents you from running packed malware?

Re: Is there any future for the GTK-based Desktop Environments?

#98

Post by rollcat »

nix23 wrote: post #66
rollcat wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OpenBSD went that route, and when they introduced pledge(2) and later unveil(2), they've applied these to every single program in the base system (over the course of a single release cycle!). There's absolutely zero reason for bc(1) to accept network connections, or for grep(1) to execve(2) into arbitrary programs. But both of these programs need to process and interpret arbitrary input, which makes them potential ta…

you really compare something like pledge and unveil with flatpack and snap's? Completely different goal's...

I don't think the security goals are that different, but you've asked why would I want to sandbox a calculator. Well - why would I not want that?

Re: Is there any future for the GTK-based Desktop Environments?

#99

Post by nix23 »

rollcat wrote: post #98
nix23 wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you really compare something like pledge and unveil with flatpack and snap's? Completely different goal's...

I don't think the security goals are that different, but you've asked why would I want to sandbox a calculator. Well - why would I not want that?

Look, you gave the openbsd example, and that's the right way to do it.

Flatpack's are for packaged software-deployment, those are two different things.

Why the need for a sandbox if you could do it much cleaner with things like pledge? But in typical linux fashion, just put another layer on top the pile of garbage so it stop's to stink for a while.

>Well - why would I not want that?

Then please start with the most obvious application sometimes called kernel.

Instead of rigorously integrate something like SElinux they throw layers over layers of half-backed "sandboxes", up to the point to separate applications with Xen (Qube-os), then you find out about Meltdown, and we are back in 1990.

Re: Is there any future for the GTK-based Desktop Environments?

#100

Post by lelanthran »

plaguepilled wrote: post #62

A preface: I use GNOME and KDE on separate devices. I have tried i3 and intend to return to it when graced with more time to customise it. Importantly, I used GNOME before GTK3 happened. I mention the above as preface because I see these kinds of posts on this website a lot and they are very misleading, and I believe I have the credentials to explain why. If you skim the original article you could be forgiven for thi…

> If that bothers you, it is far more productive to actually contribute your time to fixing the issue than simply describing it while waxing lyrical about how all these modern devs have simply 'lost the way'.

I agree with that sentiment in principle. In fact, I advocate the same myself.

However, playing the devils advocate, all an individual non-core developer can do is try to smooth out the rough edges.

If the complaint is "you removed this option", it doesn't matter if the complainer provides a patch to put it back - the powers in charge of that project already have the code (it was there before they removed it, after all), so providing a patch to add it back in is pointless.

The non-bug complaints in general (still devils advocate) are not that the software is missing a feature, it's that the direction it is going (or has gone) in is alienating the existing users.

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